Maritime Southeast Asia Between South Asia and China to the Sixteenth Century

Abstract

The maritime regions of Southeast Asia played an important but varying role in connecting South Asia and China prior to the sixteenth century. With regard to commercial exchanges, traders, ships, and polities in Southeast Asia facilitated and sometimes controlled the flow of goods. Additionally, merchant associations from South Asia and China established their bases in Southeast Asia to participate in trading activities in the Bay of Bengal and South China Sea regions. At least three distinct networks emerged as a result of these maritime interactions: 1) networks of exchanges among the polities skirting the Bay of Bengal; 2) networks that connected the areas around the South China Sea; and 3) networks of direct exchanges between South Asia and China. Buddhist ideas also circulated through these networks, but seem to have made limited inroads in the maritime regions of Southeast Asia prior to the fifth century AD. By this time, Buddhism had already spread widely in China, with significant number of Buddhist missionaries arriving in the region through the maritime routes. Rather than playing a staging role in the transmission of Buddhism to China, the doctrine may have penetrated maritime Southeast Asia due to the vibrant Buddhist interactions and a significant increase in commercial activity along the networks linking South Asia and China during the fourth and fifth centuries. The use of Buddhism to legitimise new regimes in China and the diplomatic exchanges between Southeast Asian polities and these courts may have also facilitated the spread of Buddhism in the region.

Commodity Flows, Diaspora Networking, and Contested Agency in the Eastern Indian Ocean c. 1000–1500

“…For example, in the era of the Mongol conquests numerous regional populations responded by moving to more secure settings. Thus, numerous professionals from the Persian realms of modern-day Iran took residency in South Asia and the regions beyond during the thirteenth century, as Persia-based merchants had relocated or converted to Islam when the Persian Empire fell to Muslim armies in the seventh century (Sims-Williams 1994;Sen 2003). Similarly, following the collapse of the Gupta realm in north India during the late sixth century, and again after the surrender of northern India to Muslim warriors in the eleventh century, numerous Hindu and Buddhist clerics found alternative employment in the service of south India's kings and in Southeast Asia's courts (Lieberman 2003(Lieberman , 2011Asher and Talbot 2006).…”

“…Equally, sojourning was a means by which southern Chinese sought income that could sustain themselves and their families in desperate times whether economically, politically, or culturally challenging, as migration to the South was a logical and viable option (Chang 1991). Thus the greatest eras of Chinese migration into Southeast Asia and the establishment of Chinese diaspora communities in regional downstreams corresponded to the bad times and public disorders associated with declining or failed dynasties, as for example the fall of the Song (1279) and the rise of the Yuan (1271), or the fall of the Yuan and the rise of the Ming (1368) (Clark 1991;Ptak 1998a;Sen 2003;So 1998So , 2000Whitmore 2014). Southeast Asia's acceptance as a strategic international trade intermediary as also a product source implies the periodic residence of traders and seagoing groups, who had to make stopovers waiting for a shift in the wind patterns that would allow them to return to their home ports.…”

“…Chinese dynastic records provide recognition of the different ethnicities who were members of tribute delegations that arrived at the Chinese court. Among the most prominently mentioned were the intermediary Keling Muslim merchants based in southeast India who were also linked to Middle East ports-of-trade (Sen 2003;Heng 2009;Miksic 2013). Zonal identification derived from a merchant's travels within a specific sector of the trade route that were in part dictated by the seasonal monsoon winds, for example the Bay of Bengal, South China Sea, and Java Sea networks (Ptak 1992(Ptak , 1998Frasch 1998;Subrahmanyan 1999;Hall 2011).…”

“…According to the Chinese dynastic records, Southeast Asia-based merchants traded as the representative agents of specific ports and served as members of these ports' trade and tributary delegations, and therein the Chinese records ascribed their community membership. For example, Muslim traders, who may or may not have had a Middle East origin, were regularly accounted as participants in the Southeast Asia tributary missions to the Chinese court from the eleventh century (Sen 2003;Heng 2008). The frequent presence of Muslim traders among the embassy delegations was noteworthy enough to have warranted distinctive Chinese recognition, with the implication that these diaspora in some way assured the quality of trade and the types and value of goods an alien port provided to China's marketplace (Wade 2013;Sen 2014) (see Fig.…”

“…For example, Muslim traders, who may or may not have had a Middle East origin, were regularly accounted as participants in the Southeast Asia tributary missions to the Chinese court from the eleventh century (Sen 2003; Heng 2008). The frequent presence of Muslim traders among the embassy delegations was noteworthy enough to have warranted distinctive Chinese recognition, with the implication that these diaspora in some way assured the quality of trade and the types and value of goods an alien port provided to China's marketplace (Wade 2013; Sen 2014) (see Fig. 3).…”